


Breakfast Date

by i_am_made_of_memoriies



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Developing Relationship, I love my emo son, M/M, Mary keay was a sucky mom, and fuckhands mcmike, breakfast dates are the purest form of love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-30
Updated: 2020-01-30
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:01:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22472248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/i_am_made_of_memoriies/pseuds/i_am_made_of_memoriies
Summary: Gerry continued his mother's work of collecting Leitners, but he decided to fight and destroy those entities instead of harness their power. Such a line of work is dangerous, but Gerry is lucky to have an eccentric Spiral Avatar as an ally.
Relationships: Gerard Keay/Michael
Comments: 16
Kudos: 129





	Breakfast Date

**Author's Note:**

> So many ideas for this fic came from my conversations with Athena. There are quite a few scenes that are pulled straight from our Gerrymichael ranting. So thank you to Athena for all the inspo and the title :)

Gerry knew his job was difficult. He always heard about children taking up their parents’ professions, either succeeding because of convenient nepotism, or existing to continue their family line. In some sense, Gerry was doing just that. He couldn’t continue his father’s legacy, as he was conveniently absent, but he could continue his mother’s. And he continued Mary Keay’s work out of pure spite. Gerry hunted Leitners with fervor, brushing with fear entities at every turn. But he did what his mother wasn’t smart enough to do. He burned those damn books, and one day he was going to burn Leitner too. And why not burn all the fear avatars while he was at it? Arson was convenient. 

Gerry ambled into a small, grungy goodwill in West London, his intent clear. He knew what  _ kind _ of book he was looking for, something to do with The Dark. He had tracked the book for the past couple of weeks and he was finally sure of its location. Running an apathetic finger over the worn spines of donated books, he waited until his finger hit the tell-tale label with Jurgen Leitner’s name on it. 

The aged book was tucked into the corner of a shelf, shying away from the attention of customers. Gerry immediately knew he had found what he was searching for. As soon as he plucked the book off the shelf, a bulb in the back of the goodwill fizzled out. 

“This keeps happening!” A cashier groaned, throwing his head back in exasperation. “Monique, can you hand me one of the spares?”

Gerry waited patiently at the counter, his hand rested lightly on the top of the book. The title was written in a looping cursive, reading “Tamomayi Karoti”. Though Gerry was no expert, he could assume that the title was in Sanskrit. Why would a book containing powers of a fear entity be in a living language, anyway?

“Sorry for the wait, sir,” the cashier said, flipping the book over to scan the barcode. “You speak Sanskrit?”

Gerry shrugged and placed exact change on the counter, shoving the book into his bag and stepping into the windy evening. He chose to walk back to his flat, protected from the sharp wind by his leather jacket. He dressed the way he did for fashion  _ and  _ practicality. 

Unlocking the door to his flat, Gerry placed the book carefully on his table. He lit his fireplace with haste, watching impatiently as dancing flames slowly devoured the wood. As soon as the fire sparked into a decent size, Gerry flung the book into his fireplace, stepping back into the doorway of his kitchen. The book caught instantly, erupting in sparks, and filling Gerry’s living room with a vicious crackle. 

With the same jarring abruptness as when the book caught fire, light was sucked out of Gerry’s flat. He scrambled to his front door, trusting in his muscle memory, but met only a smooth wall. The vicious crackle of his fireplace was replaced with a low rumble; it slowed in pace, manifesting into deliberate footsteps. Gerry’s heart began to race; he grabbed the torch from his pocket, flipping the switch. Nothing happened. Gerry remained in suffocating darkness. 

The footsteps grew closer, heavy and rhythmic. He ran his hands against the wall, searching desperately for a door, before he found one. His hand wrapped around a perfectly smooth, cool doorknob, not, his angular, glass doorknob. But all good reasoning escaped him in that moment. With reckless abandon, he threw the door open flinching at the blinding light. Rainbow light. Not rainbow, but undulating. He slumped against a near-by wall, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the light of the hallway. 

As expected, Gerry was not in the hallway of his apartment building. He heard something pounding against the frame of the tall, clean yellow door in front of him. Slowly, his heart rate began to even. 

“Gerard Keay.” The voice behind him made Gerry flinch in surprise. Whoever–or whatever–had spoken had a lilting, distorted voice, which seemed to be in a perpetual state of almost laughing. 

“Wow, you know my name,” Gerry sighed, turning to face whatever was behind him. “I’m terrified.”

He had expected to see some strange, unsettling figure, with far too many limbs or a body made completely out of raw meat (he saw the latter quite often, these days). He did not expect to see a tall man with curly blonde hair falling down his shoulders. The man was almost normal, but there was something wrong. Something about his gaze unsettled Gerry in a primal way. 

“I do believe I just saved your life,” the  _ thing _ said, cocking its head to one side. “The Dark can be quite malicious.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard.” Gerry’s voice dripped with sarcasm. “Also, if you know me so well already, you’d know that I hate being called Gerard.”

“Oh, I’m no Ceaseless Watcher!” It chuckled, its laugh bouncing off the walls and reverberating in a way that was completely unnatural. “I’m Michael.”

“Yeah, sure you are. Now let me go back home. I’m sure the book is pretty burned now.”

“Why don’t we get some breakfast!” Michael suggested, throwing his hands in the air in a theatrical gesture. 

Gerry snorted upon seeing Michael’s hands for the first time. His fingers were quite a bit too long and the joints didn’t quite bend as they were supposed to, an avatar of the spiral. 

“First of all, it’s at least seven in the evening,” Gerry started, his lips tugging up in a smirk. “Second of all, why would you help me? I’m fighting things like you.”

“I’m a contradiction by nature!” He chuckled, his face breaking into a grin just a bit too wide. “I do whatever I please! And it’s seven in the morning, Gerard. Let’s get breakfast.”

One of Michael’s twisting arms opened a door that surely was not there a second ago, and stepped out into the cool morning sun. 

“I’m really feeling a full English today, what about you?”

Gerry shrugged letting out a dry chuckle. He already made a terrible decision opening Michael’s door in the first place, and he was hungry anyway. It did appear to be morning, though he knew there was no way twelve hours passed since he burned the Leitner. 

“Call me Gerry and will you pay?” He asked Michael, laughing at himself for asking such an absurd question. Where would an eldritch horror get money, anyway?

“Of course, Gerry! It would be simply rude if I didn’t.” His face broke into that same unsettling grin; Gerry realized that his face quite literally  _ broke _ . Something shifted in his bone structure to allow such a smile. Somehow, in Gerry’s exhausted and confused state, he found it endearing. 

Michael led him into a small café, severely understaffed, and quite plain. A few elderly people sat, nursing ceramic mugs of coffee. All in all, the café was nearly silent. The moment Michael entered, the air in the café buzzed; it didn’t buzz in a static sense, like The Beholding, but in some undulating way that made Gerry nearly feel intoxicated. Though it had felt threatening at first, he was beginning to consider it comfortable. 

He slid into a booth, the upholstery cracking and breaking off in places. Michael sat directly in front of him, though Gerry never saw him sit down. 

“Why are you so interested in me?” Gerry asked, his badly dyed hair shaking with his head. “I get that you’re some kind of spiral freak, but why would you be siding with the enemy?”

“I never said I was siding with you, Gerry,” Michael said, his eyes widening too much. “And calling someone a freak isn’t very nice.”

“Erm, sorry then,” Gerry muttered apprehensively. “But you still haven’t answered my question. What shit are you planning with me? Are you trying to indoctrinate me into your spiral cult?”

Michael shook his head, curls flying from side to side. “Nope! I simply am not a fan of The Dark, or many other entities for that matter. I’m true to my own nature, and my nature is a contradiction. Isn’t that fun?”

Gerry sighed glancing down at the menu, though he already knew what he was going to order. 

“Now tell me about yourself, Gerry. What is your business with Leitner’s books?”

“Doing what my mum couldn’t. I destroy them.” He gratefully accepted a mug of coffee from the waiter. 

“Ah, Mary Keay,” Michael sighed, swirling a spoon in his cup of tea, which was–like everything associated with him–simply not there a second ago. “She’s almost as notorious as Gertrude Robinson, though for quite different reasons.” 

Through the distortion, Gerry could almost make out a sad twinge to Michael’s tone. 

“I know how The Spiral works,” Gerry said, hoping that he wouldn’t anger a powerful avatar with his next statement. “Who were you before the distortion? I swear I’ve seen you before.”

Much to Gerry’s relief, Michael just laughed. That same echoing chuckle that bounced off the walls of the café despite its terrible acoustics. 

“I was no one before Michael. I am Michael now, and that’s all I’ve ever been. There was a man though, Michael Shelley. One of Gertrude’s loyal guard dogs.” The edges of his form began to blur, as he lost some tangibility. 

Gerry nodded solemnly, remembering Gertrude’s sweet, blond assistant. They never really got to know each other, but he remembered that Michael Shelley was a nervous and quite caring man. 

“I think I will go now,” Michael said, rising from the booth, his body coming back into focus. “It was nice to have breakfast with you, Gerry. I’ll see you soon.” He did not mention the fact that they had never actually eaten anything.

* * *

The next time Gerry saw Michael, he found himself in a similar state of distress. His job was dangerous and he knew it well, but he didn’t often find himself on death’s door, which he would be on shortly if this flesh monster got its way. 

Gerry pulled out one of the many knives he kept stashed in his leather jacket (yet again, fashion  _ and  _ practicality) and slashed at the oozing, fleshy figure. His knife cut through its body easily, but did nothing to deter it as it continued to slash at Gerry with concerningly sharp claws. 

One claw met its mark, cutting deep into Gerry’s abdomen. He hissed in pain but did not falter. Jumping back, he stabbed at it again, still to no avail. With an infuriated grunt, he pulled an explosive from his bag laying on the ground and prepared to detonate it. The flesh monster could do little damage if it was in pieces. 

He clenched his jaw in determination and threw the explosive at the flesh monster, diving into a near-by alley for cover, though he knew it wouldn’t be sufficient. 

A door creaked open seconds before the explosion reached him and Gerry was gently pulled through the doorway. He lay supine on the floor of a bright, undulating corridor, his vision swimming from blood loss. Gerry saw Michael from the corner of his vision, gazing at his wounds. 

“Would you like me to fix those for you?” he asked. His voice was quiet and caring despite the fact that it was not quite human. 

“Of fucking course I’d like you to fix them,” Gerry hissed through pain. “I don’t want to die right now.”

Perhaps Michael’s movement was too quick for Gerry to track, or perhaps it was not perceptible at all, but Gerry found the gash in his side completely closed and devoid of even a scar. Gerry pushed himself up into a sitting position, leaning against one of the walls. 

“Why do you keep saving me?” He asked. “It’s my fault I get into these situations, and you’re gaining nothing by helping me anyway.”

Michael shrugged, his face breaking into a smile. “I think you’re interesting, Gerry. And I don’t want you to die.” 

“That might be the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me.” Gerry let out a dry chuckle. “It’s rare I run into people who aren’t actively trying to kill me, these days.”

“Let’s get a drink?” Michael motioned to a new door, his brightly colored overcoat fluttering in the wind as he stepped into the street. 

Gerry shrugged, following Michael through London’s bustling streets. He had gone out in public with more blood on him, so he didn’t feel particularly self-conscious. As he followed Michael, he found himself fighting a grin. He couldn’t tell if he could necessarily define their relationship as a friendship, but whatever it was, Gerry was enjoying the much-needed company. 

He found himself in a cozy, busy pub, sitting up at the bar next to Michael. The pub was bustling with patrons, their voices forming a low, rumbling din. Michael took a sip from a sparking purple beverage, swirling it every few minutes with a glass stirrer. 

“I don’t like beer,” he said offhandedly. “Shelley didn’t either.”

“He didn’t seem like someone who would.” Gerry focused forward, listening to Michael without making eye-contact. Gerry downed the rest of his glass of beer and set the glass on the counter with a resonant thud. “Can you even get drunk?”

Michael shrugged, letting out a non-committal hum that could have doubled as a swarm of bees. “I’ll find out!” 

Swiftly, Michael gulped the rest of his colorful beverage down, reaching for another glass and drinking it in quick succession. He downed one more glass before furrowing his brows in thought. The edges of his form began to blur as he swayed gently.

“I think it worked,” he hummed. “Curious.”

“No one can get drunk that quick,” Gerry huffed, chuckling to himself when he realized that Michael didn’t really count as a  _ person _ . “Let’s get back to my flat before you terrorize anyone in the pub.”

Michael complied, leaning on Gerry’s shoulder as he was led through a thick crowd of people. Gerry noticed how despite Michael’s current lack of full corporeality, his edges were still soft; when Gerry first met him, he was all sharp angles, abrasive and confusing. Now, Michael’s edges were rounded, protecting Gerry from any injury. He grinned slightly at that, turning to meet Michael’s swirling gaze.

“Keep your fucking mouth on,” he muttered good-naturedly. “We already look like a freakshow, with me covered in blood and you–well–being you. Let’s keep this at least vaguely human.”

“But I’m  _ not _ human, Gerry!” Michael whined, his jaw falling a little farther with his exclamation. “And if my mouth is down further, then I can finally kiss you!”

Gerry stopped abruptly, tightening his grip on Michael’s forearm when he pitched forward. Slowly, Gerry turned to face him, opening his mouth to form words, but quickly realizing he didn’t have anything to say. 

Michael pulled back from Gerry, coming fully back into focus and adjusting his jaw. He let out a shuddering breath and tucked some of his swirling hair behind his ear. 

“I’m fully sober now,” he assured. “So you know that I have full intention of what I want to say, and that I have my wits about me. But yes, I’d like to kiss you. I’ve never kissed anyone, and I don’t think Shelley did either.”

Gerry rolled his eyes, standing on his tip-toes to reach Michael’s lips. The entire experience was quite confusing; Michael’s lips weren’t as soft as they were comforting, but Gerry cherished this moment with him. When he broke away, Michael  _ broke _ . His body exploded into a blinding, colorful light, illuminating the evening streets. 

“Please look away for a second, Gerry!” Michael’s voice was even further from human now. It echoed from every corner of Gerry’s conscious, but he knew what to do. Turning away from the source of the light, he squeezed his eyes shut until he wasn’t seeing red through his eyelids. 

“You’ve really never been kissed before, huh,” he teased, reaching for one of Michael’s long, twisting hands. 

Michael stuttered, his cheeks emanating a red light. “I’d like to do it again, though.”

“Yeah, sure. Just don’t blind me next time, okay?”

* * *

Gerry never expected to enjoy domesticity, and he surely never expected to enjoy domesticity alongside an eldritch monster. But as he snuggled into the pillows of his couch, playing with the confusing spirals of Michael’s hair, watching reruns of The Great British Baking Show, he realized that this is what bliss really was. 

“I don’t think he proved the dough enough,” Michael commented, pointing a finger at the screen. “The bread is going to be awfully dense.”

“Maybe you should just go in there and tell him, then,” Gerry chuckled.

Michael perked up, hurrying to the pastel yellow door to the right of Gerry’s front door. “Really? I think that’s a wonderful idea!”

“Michael, no!” Gerry jumped up after him, grabbing his arm and leading him back to the couch. “I was just joking, but you could bake in my kitchen, I suppose, if you promise not to invert it.”

“Oh you know I can’t promise that.”

Gerry sighed contentedly and closed his eyes, his fingers still tracing swirling patterns in Michael’s hair. He was doing exactly what his mother would have resented, and he couldn’t be happier.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Gerrymichael can't be a crackship if they're the cutest couple on the planet.


End file.
